A review by Uwe Steinmueller @Digital
Outback Photo

Also photos by Bettina Steinmueller

"If
you are just now venturing into the world of fine art digital photography
you can immerce yourself in new knowledge about almost every aspect
that I can think of. The photographs on the Outback Photo site
are stunning, to say the least! The books and handbooks offer a
true wealth of knowledge because they are so well thought out and
organized in a concise manner, with numerous examples. There are
vast quantities of other resources available as well, through linking
to other sites. There are interesting and provocative stories and
essays written by both Uwe and Bettina Steinmueller and many others.
I first found the site while checking reviews of the Canon Digital
Rebel and I haven't stopped exploring ... where do Uwe and Bettina
find the time to give so much? They are excellent teachers." Eleanor
T. Culling 2/25/2004

If you work with Photoshop
CS and Nikon Capture our e-books
DOP1009 or DOP2000 are the right choice for the Nikon
D2H. DOP2000
is the more complete handbook.

1/8/2004 Camera back to Nikon

The D2H is back to Nikon. We will only update this
diary if we learn about new raw conversion options.

We have now our Nikon
Capture 4 review online. We highly recomment NC 4 for
the Nikon D2H. We have to wait when other third parties come up with
their own solutions.

11/28/2003 Nikon D2h at high ISO vs. the Canon 1D

So far we explored the camera and image quality in
terms of color. Remains the question how does the D2h perform at high
ISO (mean how much noise). There are only 2 cameras to compare to:

Nikon D1h

Canon 1D

Actually only the Canon 1D can also shoot at 8 fps and is the real
competition. We have also to keep in mind that the Canon 1D is now
2 years old (we personally expect an update soon, maybe PMA??).

Comparing noise is tricky and we never claimed or wanted to be a test
institute. So we did a rather naive comparison of both cameras at different
ISO levels and the same scene.

Also the raw converter is a big part of the equation.
We used Capture One DSLR Pro for the Canon 1D files (C1 is known to
do a great job on removing color noise). For the Nikon D2h we used
Nikon Capture 4 (with noise removal off as we did not find a good
setting in NC 4).

Note 1: With Tools like Noise
Ninja and Neat Image
you can clean up a lot of noise from high ISO shots

Note 2: This test also does not look into the noise
you get in deep shadows as we worked in a well lit scene

We used the Nikon AF-S 28-70mm f/2.8 and Canon 24-70mm f/2.8 lenses
which are both excellent zooms. The Canon 1D shots came out a
bit brighter and the Nikon D2H shots have more contrast. Sharpening
was done in both case with PhotoKit SHARPENER (only basic Capture Sharpening).

Our target

Nikon D2H

Canon 1D

ISO 200

ISO 200

ISO 400

ISO 400

ISO800

ISO 800

ISO 1600

ISO 1600

The Canon 1D has a slight edge at ISO
800 and 1600. But overall we think the Nikon D2h performed well. One
main factor is also the noise removal in C1 that showed the 1D in better
light.

11/27/2003 Nikon D2H at Santa Cruz Pier

We love to walk the pier in Santa Cruz to watch the
birds and scenery. Unfortunately we could only see pelicans in the distance.
The next images are all not cropped.

California Gull

We would say that the color rendition
is excellent. Only a few steps in Nikon Capture 4 and Photoshop CS.

Gull's tail

Boardwalk in Santa Cruz (at 280mm/420mm effective)

The above photo shows a strong saturation
that matches how we remember the reality.

Seal posing

Sleeping Seal

Seal Flippers

Gull on a lamp pole

The slight overcast help today a lot against burned
out highlights. We have to say that the results are very nice, nothing
to complain here.

11/23/2003 Nikon D2h first Impression

This is actually a second impression of the Nikon
D2h as we had the chance to use this camera for 2 days in Cleveland
in
September.
But in Cleveland we used the D2H in the environment of action sport
photography.
While this is the main market for this new camera it is not the domain
we know very well.

This time we use the D2h in the context of nature and wildlife photography.

The D2h is the replacement for the Nikon D1h and also targeted against
the current Canon 1D. There are actually only 2 cameras that are valid
competitors:

Nikon's D1h (we only know the D1x very well)

Canon's 1D

as this is a camera capable of 8 frames/sec which matches the current
leader the Canon 1D in terms of frames per second.

There are two things to any digital SLR (we borrow
again terms from Rob Galbraith):

Cameraness

Digitalness

Nikon D2H is an all new Camera

The D2h is an all new camera and not an update from
the D1h. We consider the D2h to be a statement on technology that Nikon
can deliver to professional photographers (with the main market photo
journalists).

Here is an incomplete list of features that are new with the D2h
(many a first for Nikon and even for all digital cameras):

Body that is quite light but still 100% professional

Much larger view in the 100% viewfinder

Largest LCD ever available on a digital SLR with 2.5"

All new 11 point auto focus system

Light yet amazing lasting batteries (about 2000 shots possible
on one charge, we did 900 shots and the battery was more than half
full)

Much improved flash system (and the Nikon flash system was quite
advanced before) that allows the cordless synchronization of multiple
slaves

8 fps bursts

Buffer can hold 40 JPGs or 24 RAW(NEF, if noise reduction is off)

New Nikon LBCAST sensor (Nikon says it is neither an CCD nor a
CMOS sensor)

Instant camera on (You switch the camera on and can shoot, virtually
zero wait time)

Virtually no shutterlag

Yes, the new D2H is a very impressive camera if it
comes to the "cameraness". So far we don't see any fault here. Congratulations
Nikon!

Let us summarize the features which we think are most
important:

The viewfinder is in a new class for Nikon and rivals the Canon
1D/1Ds (we will check into it later)

an LCD in this size is heaven for judging exposure

The D1/D1x/D1h were notorious lacking enough power for longer sessions
and the memory effect was painful. The D2h has the lightest and longest
lasting battery we seen in any digital pro camera. Great power management!

The 11 point autofocus works great

Now even compressed NEFs are stored fast enough to be useable (3.5
- 4.7MB depending on detail level).

The 8 fps speak for themselves and can even be handy for us photographing
wildlife.

Note: Some experts indicate that Nikon
uses a "visually lossless" compression. This means for
ultimate quality you might be safer to use the uncompressed NEF
format. We don't see that much of a problem using compressed NEFs.

Terms:

Lossless compression: there is no data loss or truncation
whatsoever

Visually Losslesscompression: There is data loss
but you should no be able to see the difference. But stronger image
manipulation
may
reveal the data loss.

D2H Image Quality

As we cannot fault the "cameraness" in any aspect
it all boils down to image quality.

The D2H is designed for speed and as such the resolution is limited
to 4MP. But even the D1H served journalists well at 2.7 MP. So the
4MP is matching the Canon 1D and will be enough for most journalistic
work. There will be always a tradeoff between speed and resolution
(but we still expect Canon come out with a follow up to their 1D as
next year
are the Olympic games).

All the following images were converted using Nikon Capture 4.0 (we
will add an overview and review of NC 4.0 later). The only other application
right now that can handle D2H is Adobe Camera
Raw 2.0 in PS
CS. But ACR 2.0 did not get a final and official calibration
for the Nikon D2H. We used mainly our Nikon AF-S 80-200mm f/2.8, Nikon
AF-S 28-70 and the TC-14E tele converter. We consider these zooms
to be excellent.

Rock in Tide

All our first shots were at lowest
ISO (which is ISO 200 for the D2H).

The above shot was made in full sunlight
but shaded using the Lastolite
Translucent Tri-Grip Reflector. We later corrected the
WB using a GretagMacbeth Mini Colorchecker and added some "digital
sun" to it.

Here is the shot in sunlight (watch
the harsh shadows)

Same scene in harsh sunlight

Hair like algae at Point Lobos

This was photographed in full sunlight.
The color reproduction is very good.

As Rob Galbraith mentioned the photos
show more saturation by default. Rob likes it while we are not sure.
On the other side it gives the pictures a more film like look. Overall
the image quality is there at ISO 200.

We will look more into the shadow noise
and higher ISO later. We also plan to take the same shots with the
Canon 1D and the D2h for comparison.

Note
on exposure histograms (also valid for all Canon cameras):

We as photographers
want a histogram that shows all three RGB channels as the current
luminosity histograms
do not show blown channels (mainly red or blue). As far as we know
only the Fuji S2 and the Sigma SD 10 (a bit small though) show channel
histograms.

We will repeat
this request until we get it in all(!) digital cameras. We already
successfully influenced some raw converters
to show channel histograms!